John Conceison: Bill Rodgers and other running royalty set for Charlie's Surplus 10-miler reunion at Worcester's Elm Park

John Conceison

Saturday

Mar 16, 2019 at 5:32 PMMar 16, 2019 at 5:32 PM

Come the first Sunday of June, an age of the running community at its most competitive will converge on Elm Park in Worcester, enlivening the memories of remarkable Mother's Days past.

Echoes and images of a time when the world running community strutted its best in Central Mass. — we could only be talking about when the Charlie's Surplus 10-miler was a can't-miss event among many of the world's best.

During an encounter about a dozen years ago, Bill Rodgers didn't even need to hear a question, and started to express his feelings about Charlie's.

"You're from Worcester? Oh my, it was so wonderful running Charlie's. There aren't 10-milers like them anymore. The city of Worcester needs a wonderful event like that."

Thanks to Mark Epstein, The Pathfinder, son of proprietor and race founder Charlie Epstein, many of the standouts of yesteryear will be back at Elm Park to celebrate Charlie, the race and the dedication of a memorial near the old finish line at the Charlie's Memorial Reunion Gala Unveiling.

"It's going to be the greatest collection of long-distance runners assembled at the same time in Worcester," said Mark Epstein, who earlier this month was in the city to secure unanimous approval from the Parks Commission for the June 2 event. "To honor the memory of the race and Charlie, it'll be like the who's who of sport."

Hopes are high that not only the runners, but the many race volunteers and spectators who witnessed the wonder of it all also will be on hand, and of course, the general public, many of whom were not yet around for Charlie's.

The 10-miler with the Charlie's Surplus label enjoyed an amazing run, from 1976 to '84, as the distance boom began taking off.

"We had a combination of luck, guts and determination to pull off the race," said Mark, who relocated to South Carolina in 1989 and recently retired after a successful teaching/coaching career.

The Boston Marathon planted the idea in Charlie Epstein for the Worcester event. Charlie took Mark to the finish line at the Prudential Center each year through the '60s and '70s "We'd stay until the last runner finished," Mark said. "The whole ride home, he was so pumped, and he couldn't wait until the next year."

By 1976, Charlie Epstein had for several years sponsored athletic efforts all over Worcester, including the first girls' basketball league at Greenwood Park. Following the specter of Rodgers' record-setting performance at the 1975 Boston Marathon, Charlie declared he wanted a road race.

"I was probably the least surprised when he said that," Mark Epstein said. "But we really didn't know then if he'd have more than one."

Charlie Epstein didn't have any particular design in mind for a course, but he had a supreme vision of the finish.

"I never met anyone in Worcester that Elm Park meant more to than my dad," said Mark, his dad's right-hand man throughout the race's nine-year run as Charlie's. "It was very sentimental to him as one of the first parks of its kind in America.

"When he decided to have the race, all he said to the coaches at Doherty was he wanted a 10-mile course in the west side of Worcester, and that the finish line was at Elm Park."

And what keyed the event's success was securing the participation of the man who crossed the finish line first over those first two runnings.

"Bill Rodgers basically fell into our laps," Epstein said. After all, Rodgers' in-laws at the time lived in Worcester.

There was communication between Charlie Epstein and the father-in-law about getting the son-in-law to run. Rodgers' schedule in '76 was crazy, but didn't include defending his title in Boston that April.

"He had said he was cutting back because of the upcoming Olympic Trials yet looking for a tuneup," Mark Epstein said. "Charlie said, 'I'll put it on Mother's Day, and Billy said, 'I'm in.' "

"I remember it like yesterday," Rodgers said last week of the inaugural race. "Going up that hill at the 5-mile mark — Bancroft Tower Hill — and then barreling down. It was something new, and it was competitive as heck."

"Billy made it so much easier for us to establish a tradition for the race," Epstein said. "When you think of the runners we attracted from all over the world, we wondered how the hell we did it."

Mark Murray, now the St. John's High cross-country coach, won the race in 1980. Geoff Smith was a winner at Charlie's before he even ran a race for Providence College, and before achieving marathon fame in Boston and New York.

"You got to this race, and they just wanted you to be part of the family," said Smith, who won Charlie's in 1981 and '82. "They treated us like royalty. And you always had a quality field, and that makes a race special."

In 1977, Rodgers returned on Mother's Day to defend his Charlie's title, and a talented field continued to chase him. He'll be in attendance at the Elm Park reunion, along with scores of other former elites.

"He couldn't come every year," Epstein said, "but no two people contributed more to the success in the '70s and '80s than Bill Rodgers and Charlie Epstein."

"It was a classic course," said Smith, who also will be on hand for the June 2 gala. "I didn't know who Bob Hodge was, who Greg Meyer was, those were just names to me. I was running along side Bob the first time, and someone shouted, 'You'll take him on the hills, Bobby.'

"It's engraved in my brain — you'll never forget Bancroft Hill."

In 1984, no fewer than 12 Olympic Trials qualifiers used Charlie's as a tuneup, prior to the trials three weeks later in Buffalo. Runner Magazine ranked the world's top 100 road races that year, considering strength of field and quality. Charlie's rated 95th that year, an honor extremely pleasing the Epsteins.

"I still have that magazine article framed in my house," Mark said.

The Epsteins bowed out of the race before the 1985 run, as the purses had become an integral part of the running game.

"It was the money, it became big business," Mark said. "The Randy Thomases, the Lynn Jennings, the Patti Catalanos — they all had the right to make a comfortable living for themselves.

"The sponsorships weren't big enough to continue, and the Telegram & Gazette (which assumed control of the event and into the 1990s) couldn't pull it off, either.

"Dad did it through hustle and personality," Mark added. "He was so darned humble and personable."

"Charlie was a little ahead of his time," Rodgers said. "He had that kind of sense that the running boom was going to last a long time."

The June 2 event will encourage all attending to walk, jog or just congregate in Elm Park from about 2:30 p.m. until a speaking program begins at 3, with former mayor and city councilor, Tim Cooney, as emcee, followed by all former elite runners willing to take the mike and express what the Charlie's Surplus 10-miler meant to them.

Performing in concert at the event will be local band Ric Porter and Sons of the Soil.

This undertaking has been a long time coming, and Mark Epstein credits his wife of 23 years, Barbara, for her unyielding support.

"She's not from around her, but she gets it," he said. "I didn't really have to sell it. She understands over the last 20 years how much I wanted to do this."

Charlie Epstein passed away in 1999. "The loss for me was more profound," Mark said. "A lot of time had to go by before I took this on."

After revision upon revision what shall read on the memorial, Mark Epstein is finally pleased with the plaque's epitaph.

"This race will now have a home at Elm Park forever," he said. "It's fitting that a monument has home at the Surplus race finish line, honoring the event's contribution to the city of Worcester, to Dad, to commemorate the race of the '70s and '80s. It was so much more than just a race."

Lancers with One Love

The Worcester State women's lacrosse team will host its second One Love Foundation 5K on Saturday before its game against Western Connecticut State University.

The One Love Foundation was founded in 2010 to honor the memory of Yeardley Love, a women's lacrosse student-athlete at the University of Virginia who was a victim of relationship violence. The Foundation was established to ensure everyone understand the difference between a healthy and an unhealthy relationship.

Registration for the race is available online, with all proceeds benefiting the One Love Foundation.

Check-in for the race begins at 8 a.m., with the race slated to begin at 9. The Lancers face off against the Colonels starting at 1 p.m.

For more information, visit the event page on Facebook, or contact coach Kelly Downs at kdowns@worcester.edu.